By: Siyabonga Sithole
Johannesburg - It was a day that marks one of the darkest tragedies of post apartheid South Africa.
On the afternoon of August 16, 2012, 34 miners on strike for better wages were gunned down by police at Lonmin mine’s “the koppie” mountain following an instructive email from President Cyril Ramaphosa to then police minister Nathi Mthethwa calling for “concomitant” action against the miners.
Ramaphosa was a shareholder of the mine.
Ten years later, the lawyer for the miners and families of the 34 miners who perished, said that a high court ruling supported his client’s view that Ramaphosa caused the massacre.
Last month the South Gauteng High Court found Ramaphosa liable for the killing and injuring of striking miners who were demanding a better wage.
Judge Frits van Oosten found that Ramaphosa and Sibanye-Stillwater (formerly Lonmin) were complicit in the events leading up to the killing of the miners.
Oosten upheld four of Ramaphosa’s exceptions, rejecting one, in which he found that Ramaphosa had taken part in, planned and endorsed the co-operation between the mine and the South African Police Service. This is the first time a court has linked Ramaphosa to being the mastermind behind the massacre.
Reacting to the court ruling, the attorney for the miners, Andries Nkome, said that his clients felt vindicated that after “the costly, arduous and protracted litigation the courts shared their view that politicians, particularly Cyril Ramaphosa, caused the massacre”.
“If police attended to a labour unrest, they would have brought rubber bullets and water canons. Now he (Ramaphosa) managed to sway the operation to a dastardly criminal act, and as such the army was called in and mortuary vans were mobilised instead of ambulances … clearly the result was foreseen,” said Nkome.
The EFF said the Marikana Massacre and the Bosasa and Phala Phala Farmgate scandals proved that “the love of money” would be Ramaphosa’s downfall.
EFF national spokesperson Sinawo Thambo said the high court held that Ramaphosa has a case to answer as the alleged mastermind behind the toxic collusion between the South African government and Sibanye-Stillwater which resulted in the massacre of workers in Marikana.
“This is a small but significant step in the right direction. The trial is long overdue for Ramaphosa to be exposed for his toxic role in the gunning down of mineworkers” Thambo said.
“Justice for the victims of the Marikana Massacre might be slow but it will come. The National Prosecuting Authority must now charge Ramaphosa criminally for his role in the massacre of African mineworkers, whose only sin was asking for a living wage.”
The Association of Mining and Construction Workers’ Union (Amcu) has called on Ramaphosa to meet the Marikana widows.
Amcu president Joseph Mathunjwa said some of the living conditions of the widows were deplorable.
“Can you imagine going underground in that cage full of males, going down at night, 3am and 4am, and you still have to take care of children?
“We have written to him and we placed some demands of those who were injured and the widows and majority of the workers he acknowledged. But there was no meeting – we asked for an audience but there was nothing,” said Mathunjwa.
Meanwhile, several SAPS members appeared in the North West High Court in connection with the murder of several Marikana miners but no politician has been brought to account yet.
The president of the African Transformation Movement, Vuyo Zungula, said police officials were being “thrown under the bus”.
“Why are they going for people who are at the bottom?”
“It’s a problem for us. These cops have families and they were carrying out instructions. The president and others need to be charged too,” said Zungula.
Zungula said the Farlam Commission of Inquiry had failed to deal with the real reason for the deaths of the Marikana miners.
Questions remain as to why police used over 4000 rounds of ammunition and why four mortuary vans were waiting if there was no intention for the miners to be killed.
The Star